Word: runoff
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...political erosion is apparent in the opinion polls. Five months ago, Giscard was expected to take 35% of the vote in the first round and 59% in the second-round runoff between the two top vote getters. Now four polls give him only 27% to 28% in the first round. For the decisive second round, two polls showed Mitterrand winning with 51% and 54%. Another saw Giscard gaining a sum victory, while a fourth predicted a dead heat. Giscard appeared to acknowledge that his campaign was in trouble by calling his top strategists to the Elysée Palace...
...that event Giscard and Mitterrand would face each other in a May 10 runoff, and Marchais's Communists could be instrumental in swinging the outcome either...
...Socialist-Communist Alliance's scorching defeat in the 1978 legislative elections, and the ensuing disarray within France's leftist opposition, had given the impression that Giscard could be re-elected without much effort. As recently as November, polls gave him 59% of the vote in a runoff against Mitterrand, a significant improvement over the paper-thin 50.8% majority with which he was elected in 1974. But the latest surveys show Giscard winning only around 30% in the first round, scheduled for April 26, and 50% to 52% in a second-round runoff against Mitterrand, his most likely final...
...elected, he would call for new parliamentary elections and then form a coalition based on whatever majority emerges. He is deliberately vague because he must strike a delicate balance if he is to have any chance of winning. On the one hand, he needs Communist votes, especially in the runoff. On the other, he must appear reassuringly anti-Communist to the tiny but crucial bloc of middle-of-the-road voters who might be wooed away from Giscard...
...former Premier and De Gaulle Aide Michel Debré, 69, further complicates the race. Gaullists, who consider Giscard a usurper, will no doubt favor Chirac or Debré in the first round. Giscard's re-election may depend on how many return to the fold in a runoff against Mitterrand...